Lawyer body search row looms over fate of Gaddafi’s son

ALLEGATIONS of mystery documents hidden in a lawyer’s underwear are at the centre of a worsening crisis between Libya and the International Criminal Court (ICC) over the fate of Saif al-Gaddafi, former playboy son of the late dictator.

The saga began when an ICC lawyer, Melinda Taylor, arrived earlier this month in the mountain town of Zintan, 100 miles south east of Tripoli, to meet with Saif, who is accused by the court of crimes against humanity.

Saif, once seen as the heir to his executed father Muammar, has been in detention in Zintan since being arrested by the town’s militia while trying to flee Libya last November.

Since then, he has been the subject of a tug-of-war between the ICC and Libya, which insists it will try him on home soil and not send him to The Hague.

Taylor, a 36-year-old Australian, met Saif to ask if he wanted a lawyer to represent him.

But, insist the Libyans, she was also trying to pass him documents to sign which would give one of his aides the power of attorney to sell off millions of pounds of Gaddafi family assets held abroad.

Adem Zintani, head of the town’s militia, yesterday said the documents were found in her underwear, after she was tricked into revealing their existence.

He said that Zintani officials had insisted a Libyan observer sit-in on her meeting with Saif, in the fortified villa that is his prison.

As a compromise, he said the Zintan agreed that the observer selected would be a deaf and dumb man, so that he could observe the meeting but not listen to the conversation between lawyer and defendant. In fact, said Zintani, the observer was not deaf and spoke fluent English. “Immediately he realised that something was going on,” said Zintani. The meeting was terminated and Taylor was escorted out of Saif’s room. “She [Taylor] refused to be searched. Then they brought a woman soldier to search her. In her underwear we found the documents.”

Libya has yet to produce the alleged incriminating documents, triggering demands from the United Nations, Nato and the ICC itself for the release of Taylor and her Lebanese translator.

Two other ICC officials, a Russian diplomat and a Spanish lawyer, have been told they are free but have elected to remain in Zintan to give Taylor moral support.

Yesterday, Australia’s foreign minister Robert Carr broke off a visit to the Middle East to fly to Tripoli to try to mediate.

He emerged from meetings with Tripoli officials to say he hoped for a quick release of the hostages.

Speaking to The Scotsman in the lobby of a Tripoli hotel, Carr said he was acting as “broker” for Taylor’s release, but declined to say what the ICC should apologise for.

Libya insists its claims about illicit documents are correct, with prosecutors declaring that Taylor will be held for a further month.

Whatever the truth of the story, the incident has worsened relations between the court and Libya. The arrest of a diplomat, and search of her underwear, a clear breach of international conventions, will do nothing to enhance the reputation of Libya as it seeks support for the first elections in more than 40 years, due to be held next month.